Known as the Crossroads of America, Indiana is a Midwest State that has been opened up to the world by transportation ranging from the steamships that once dominated the Great Lakes and Erie Canal to Victorian-era railways to the interstate highway system that now dominates America. From the first native tribes who occupied the area some 10,000 years ago to today, the changing face of Indiana residents has moved the state in a variety of different directions.

The changes Indiana has undergone throughout its history can be evidenced by the places that its residents have chosen to abandon. Whether discarded because a newer form of transportation became available, a disease ravaged a community or because a group of people was forced out, the ghost towns of Indiana reveal how the times here have changed. Learning more about these lost places not only highlights mistakes of the past but can bring to light some of the more interesting aspects of local history.

Baltimore - On the Banks of the Wabash

On the banks of the Wabash River in what is now Warren County once sat a small town by the name of Baltimore. Once, rows of brick houses and businesses dominated this early 1800s community, but today visitors will find the only evidence that Baltimore existed are a community cemetery and a brick home at the intersection of Baltimore Hill Road and Indiana State Road 263.

A drawing of the area from the 1877 Warren County Atlas

Baltimore’s time in the sun was so brief that even by 1900 it was considered a ghost town. Surveyors William Willmeth and Samuel Hill laid out the community in 1829, and by the following year it had a population of 70 people. Hill settled in the area running a stock farm and had the largest number of cattle in the county at the time. Other structures in the town included a market, a well, a meeting house, several stores, a tavern, distillery and docks on the Wabash River.

This pre-Civil War home is the only structure from the city of Baltimore that still remains intact.

At the time, the Wabash was the main means of travel into the area. Rafts and steamships brought goods up and down the river to the early settlers of Indiana, and the residents of Baltimore earned considerable revenue as their own was a stopping point for boats. Things changed in the 1840s when the Wabash and Erie Canal was completed, putting the main river traffic on the opposite bank from Baltimore.

The canal allowed travelers to connect from the Great Lakes down to the Gulf of Mexico. It became the main method of transportation across Indiana until it was eventually replaced by railroads. While the new canal allowed many communities to thrive - like Terre Haute and Evansville - it killed others like Baltimore. With the community’s one major source of income no longer viable, people began deserting Baltimore for more profitable areas of the state. By the 1880s, only a row of brick houses that had once existed in the town still stood and by the 1910s, the area was all but abandoned. ​

Busro/West Union - The Shaker Village

In the early 1800s, a group of people seeking religious freedom began moving into America’s Mid-West in hopes of finding a place to peacefully practice their religion. Officially known as the United Society of the Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing, these people referred to themselves as Aletheans or the Millennial Church. However, their neighbors referred to them as Shakers because of the spontaneous movements they made while attempting to achieve ecstasy during their worship services. ​

The West Union covered bridge sits on a road that was once part of the Shaker settlement known as Busro or West Union.

Among other things, Shakers believed in the separation of the sexes, celibacy, communal ownership of property and equality. Shakers were also by-and-large pacifists, a fact that drew ire from many of their neighbors when able-bodied Shaker men did not sign up to participate in conflicts like the War of 1812. Of course, the strictest tenet was the separation of men and women and belief in celibacy, even after marriage, which is probably why the religion ended up floundering. ​

A typical Shaker village.

Being oppressed in the east, many Shakers moved into Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana in the hopes of opening the gospel to the West. In 1809, a group of Shaker missionaries lead by Issachar bates came to Indiana in hopes of finding peace at a new settlement called Busro along the Busseron Creek. However, their neighbors quickly grew suspicious of the shakers and tried to force them from the area. ​

The Shakers stood their ground and soon had converted many residents, including freed blacks who liked the ideas of equality preached by the Shakers. Eventually, the name of the community was changed from Busro to West Union. By the 1820s, the small Shaker community spanned 1,300 acres and had a population of some 400 people. A meeting house with dormitories for many residents was part of the community as was a community kitchen, doctor’s office, tannery, weavery, wash house and smokehouse. Another meeting house and two other dormitories were also located on the property as were a sawmill, grist mill, fulling mill and various orchards and barns.

Despite the hard work of its residents, the Busro community seemed doomed from the start, and disaster would quickly rain down upon the community. The history of the area was chronicled in the diaries of resident Samuel Sawn McClelland, who came here in 1811 and lived here until 1827. The Shakers soon found their community was built on a native trail that the local Shawnee used to attack the settlement and fort at Vincennes in 1811. The natives stole horses and food from the Shakers and were impossible to chase over the swamp.

As part of their services, Shakers would often dance themselves into a frenzy during worship services, particularly during the 1800s during a period known as the Age of Manifestations.

That same year, the New Madrid fault let forth a mighty earthquake that some thought was a sign of the end of times. Being that the Shakers were very eager to see the end times, this wasn't necessarily a bad thing for them. However, the earthquakes followed by the violence expressed at them by other locals led to the abandonment of the settlement for a few months. The Shakers found themselves outcasts. The native tribes in the area didn't want to deal with them because of their distrust in whites and their fellow white settlers were suspicious of their religious beliefs.

Many members of the Shaker faith who lived in Knox County are buried at the Shaker Prairie Shepherd Cemetery.

Things did not get easier for the Shakers once they returned to their community. A tornado struck the community in 1819. An arsonist attempted to burn down one of the dwellings later that year. In 1820, a series of spring floods damaged much of the property. However, the Shaker’s biggest undoing were their practices. Many of the children raised in the faith didn’t want to follow its strict rules. With the younger generation leaving the faith and celibacy preventing Shakers from procreating, the population began to dwindle.

In 1826, the elders of the Shaker church decided to close the West Union community and it was fully abandoned by 1827. Many of the believers went on to the Whitewater Shaker Settlement in Ohio, which had been founded in 1827. Others joined the German Rappite utopian community in New Harmony. A few archeaological remains still exist in the area along the river where the Busro-West Union community once stood, but perhaps the most lasting mark left behind by this community is in the minds of the locals. Residents of ​the area still call it Shaker Prairie.

Fort Ouiatenon - Place of the Whirlpool

The Fort Ouiatenon Blockhouse Museum located outside Lafayette is one of the region’s oldest structures and highlights the various forces that controlled the Indiana territory. Now part of a 17.4-acre state park, the replica of the block fort structure is used to educate visitors about Indiana’s early days and hosts an annual reenactment showing how Native Americans and early pioneers eked out a living here in the 1700s.

Before the French arrived in Indiana, the Wea - a Miami-Illinois tribe - had dubbed the area where the fort now sits “waayaahtanonki,” which means place of the whirlpool. This was probably because the Wabash River near this site was dangerous to navigate in canoes, and so natives had to take their boats out of the water and drag them to safer waters. When the French corrupted the pronunciation into Ouiatenon and the Wea people were often referred to as the Ouiatenon afterwards.

A canoe on the Wabash River near the fort. This area is still a popular place to recreate.

The French built their fort here in 1717, making it the first European fort in present-day Indiana. Fur trappers often stopped here to trade with the Wea while French soldiers used the fort to prevent British forces from advancing into the French territories here. The French even convinced the Wea to trade exclusively with the French. It is believed some 3,000 people lived in and around the fort, which also provided an important economic source for nearby Wea and Kickapoo villages.

However, things changed when France surrendered Indiana to the British in 1760. British troops were dispatched to the fort and began occupying it in 1761. They didn’t get along with the natives as well as the French and during Pontiac's War in 1763, a force consisting of Wea, Kickapoo and Mascouten tribesmen captured the fort without firing a shot. The British made little use of the fort thereafter, though it was used as a staging ground in the later 1700s. The British lost the fort to the Americans in 1779, but didn’t make much use of the fort either.​

By the 1780s, local natives had moved into the fort grounds and used it as a launching point for attacks on American settlers encroaching on their lands. As a result, George Washington ordered the destruction of the fort in 1791. American militia marched on the fort and surrounding native villages, destroying them and attacking the people who resided there

A typical native village in frontier Indiana.

. By the time the fort was captured, the American forces had killed 38 natives and taken 58 prisoner, mostly women and children. With the fort gone and settlers moving in, the few tribes that still lived in the area packed up to find safer homes. A commemorative marker to the fort was first erected in 1909, and a replica fort was constructed in the 1930s. Today, the fort stands as a testament not only to the early European settlers of Indiana but the dozens of native villages that once occupied the Wea Plains in Tippecanoe County.

Hindostan Falls - Downed by Disease

Diseases ranging from the Bubonic plague to the Spanish flu have killed or at least put a dent in the population of entire communities for centuries. During the late 1700s and early 1800s, cholera and yellow fever were two of the biggest diseases that caused epidemics across America. With people still superstitious about daily cleaning habits and many modern medical advancements still decades off, diseases spread rapidly and often uncontrollably, as the people of Hindostan Falls would learn.

Martin County in Indiana has had nine county seats in its history, and its first was Hindostan, which was the largest city when the county was founded. Founded at the falls on the east fork of the White River in 1816, the town was part of a stagecoach route between New Albany and Vincennes, one of few in the state of Indiana. The town began expanding so rapidly that families began living in their boats and carts until homes could be built.

At its peak, Hindostan had a population of some 1,200 people, including those who lived in houseboats on the river. The town boasted two mills, a hotel, whetstone factory, post office, button factory, river ferries, churches and various other structures. Future president William Henry Harrison made a stop at one of the local taverns, and tavern keeper Frederick Sholts was elected to the Indiana State Senate in 1819. He proposed that Hindostan be made the seat of a new county - Martin County. Construction on a courthouse began soon after.

The luck for the frontier community ran out by the summer of 1820. Between the water of the river and the travelers coming from both stage and ferry, Hindostan was an area where diseases had plenty of ways to spread. A combination epidemic of yellow fever and cholera broke out across town. The water and insect-born diseases were so intense residents began believing their town was the victim of a plague. Built right next to the river, the city was a good breeding ground for disease.

many of the deceased were buried in mass graves since there was little time and few people to properly mourn them. An economic depression around this time only worsened conditions for the town. ​Families began fleeing the area in droves, and along with them went a fair amount of currency that was being stored in the town in preparation for its status as the new capital. After the town treasurer died, some $15,000 in gold and silver coins was reported missing. Many believe the treasurer buried the money somewhere around the town, expecting to recover them after he felt better. Treasure seekers still comb the area looking for the money, and many claim to have encountered the spirit of the town treasurer, protecting his loot.

After Hindostan began to disappear off the map, the county seat was moved to Mount Pleasant and eventually came to its present site of Shoals, which is around eight miles from the Hindostan site. Many residents moved to nearby Loogootee. The post office ceased to operate in Hindostan in 1830, and by the 1840s, visitors to the area reported the area was a ghost town with crumbling buildings. Today, none of the original Hindostan structures exist.

However, a pioneer style church was built in the area decades after the loss of Hindostan and works to preserve the pioneer graves and markers that still guard the bodies of those felled by fever here. Much of the area where the town once stood is part of the Hoosier National Forest and remains like it would have looked when the first pioneers came overland or up the river to settle Hindostan. ​The area - now known as Hindostan Falls - is still a popular recreation area for local residents.

Mollie - Gas Boom City

In the farmlands of Blackford County along County Road 400 North once sat the town of Mollie. No original buildings from this town stand here any longer, though bricks from a few of them were used to construct nearby houses. It may be hard for many to believe that these Indiana farm fields were once the site of an early American oil boom, one of the first in the country.

The Trenton Oil Field was first discovered outside Eaton, Ind. in 1876 and lasted until around 1900. The community of Mollie rose up and disappeared just as suddenly as the gush from an oil well. By the time oil was discovered in nearby Hartford City in 1887, Mollie was a small township in rural Indiana. Named after an early resident, the town was a small cluster of houses around a train station, cider mill, general store and blacksmith shop when the oil business came to the region. After oil was discovered in Hartford City, other wells were dug around Molly and began producing oil by 1890. Men came in to work the rigs and Mollie became a boomtown thanks to its proximity to the oil fields and the railroad.

A post office had been established in 1888, but only lasted for a few months. The influx of residents brought back a new post office in 1890 along with a grocery store, feed mill, livestock station, manufacturing plant, brick and tile mill and several more residences. However, the end of the gas boom proved the first of the community’s misfortunes. By 1907, the post office was discontinued and workers began leaving the area. Some of the service providers in town followed them. Then, the demand for automobile traffic and the new highway system took the railroad from Mollie.

Without easy access to the rest of the world via highway or rail, many businesses like the tile factory closed and moved elsewhere. Passenger rail stopped running through Mollie in 1941 and by 1972, the town’s population was only four people. Since then, all of the former commercial businesses have been demolished. Two homes, including one made from the bricks of the town’s former business district, are still located in the area that once was Mollie. ​

Monument Valley - Beneath the Salamonie

In 2012, a large drought that impacted much of America’s breadbasket caused Indiana’s Salamonie lake to dry up. As the waters receded, the full remains of Monument City was revealed to the world for the first time since the reservoir was created in 1965. The foundations of old buildings, bricks long submerged by the waters and the homes of the city’s 30 odd residents still lie beneath the lake. Today, visitors to the Lost Bridge State Recreation Area still search for glimpses of the city beneath the lake. ​

Prior to the Civil War, the area around Monument City was mainly farmland. Following the Civil War, the people of the area erected a monument to those who had lost their lives during the war, a marble structure that was erected in 1868. Surveyors in 1874 platted a town named for this structure and called it Monument City. A saw mill opened and began drawing in businesses including a blacksmith, cobbler, general store and others. A school and several churches soon followed.

However, the population began to dwindle following World War II and by the time the state of Indiana and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers had decided to dam the Salamonie River, only 30 some families lived in the area. Rising waters on the river created by a dam downstream were posing a danger to other communities around the county, and so the decision was made to sacrifice Monument City to save others. In 1964, the people of Monument City were told they had to leave their town behind.

Residents moved to other communities and the bodies in the Monument City Memorial Cemetery - as well as the Civil War Monument for which the town was named - were moved across the new lake. Construction of the dam began in 1966 and when it was finished, the dam stood at 133 feet tall and 6,100 feet long. Salamonie Lake now encompasses some 4.5 miles of land and is open to recreation such as boating, swimming and fishing. A state forest recreation area also goes around the lake and through some of the land that was once the outskirts of Monument City.

During the winter months and when droughts dry up the lake bed, the waters recede enough to show sometimes the tops and other times more extensive remains of Monument City. Many visitors now come here at lower tides in hopes of catching a glimpse of this Indiana Atlantis. Others come to the lakeshore to relive old memories and talk about the place they once called home.

Each year, former residents of Monument City gather at the park and the Salamonie River Dam to memorialize their former home town, which exists now only in ruins, pictures and their memories. Many of those who remember living here are in their 70s or 80s, so they will not be able to tell their stories for long. As a result, the Lost Bridge Recreation Area has begun a collection of information to help educate visitors about the city. When the water is low, the Indiana DNR also gives tours of the site, helping preserve the memories of Monument City. ​

Prophetstown - Tecumseh's Village

Outside Battle Ground, Ind. is the site of Prophetstown State Park, an area known for its picnicking areas, campsites, naturalist center and trails for hiking and biking. A 1920s-style farmstead is also located on the property, but the area that harkens back to Prophetstown’s history the most is the replica of a Shawnee council house and lodge located on the park site. Only a mile east from the site of the famed Battle of Tippecanoe, this is the area where the famed leader Tecumseh and his family once lived. ​

Replicas of a Shawnee medicine lodge and council hall are all that remain on the former Prophetstown site.

The leader of the Shawnee, Tecumseh grew up in what is now Ohio but was forced back into Indiana by white settlers and American forces. With him was his brother, Lalawethika whose name mean “He Makes a Loud Noise.” Tecumseh’s younger brother had suffered from alcoholism after liquor was introduced to his people, but when he became sober, he experienced a religious revival. A series of witch hunts he conducted seemed to rid the natives of smallpox.

Known to whites as the Shawnee Prophet, Lalawethika took a new name: Tenskwatawa meaning “The Open Door.” He began predicting an apocalypse that would destroy the white settlers and urged his fellow Shawnee to give up white ways such as firearms, liquor, and European style clothing. He also urged native groups to stop ceding or selling their land to the whites. Forced into Indiana, Tenskwatawa settled in what is now known as Prophetstown. Dozens of native tribes followed him, including his brother. By 1811, their new settlement was drawing the attention of the American government.

Fearing the mass of natives gathering together, future president and Gen. William Henry Harrison attacked the Shawnee at the Battle of Tippecanoe. Tecumseh had ordered his brother to evacuate the women and children at Prophetstown if it appeared the Shawnee were losing the war. However, Tenskwatawa had a vision and proclaimed the white army could not hurt them. He was wrong and Harrison’s men quickly took the village. Tenskwatawa was then dismissed as a charlatan. Though dismissed for his religious preachings, Tenskwatawa continued to follow his brother throughout the period known as Tecumseh's War from the Battle of Tippacanoe until the Shawnee leader's death in Canada in 1813. He was not with his brother at the time of his death.

Painting of Tenskwatawa by George Catlin in 1830.

Tenskwatawa remained in Canada until 1825 when he returned to join the rest of the Shawnee in their forced march west of the Mississippi. He lead a group of around 500 from a reservation at Wapaghkonetta, Ohio to what is now the neighborhood of Argentine in Kansas City, Kan. In fact, this second village he established would grow to become Kansas City. The area that was Prophetstown became farmland over the years until efforts began in 1989 began to make the area a state park. In 2004, it finally became an Indiana State Park and memorialized the Shawnee who briefly called the area home. ​

Renner - The Railroad Station

Mollie was not the only community outside Hartford City that was bolstered by the railroad during the 1800s. Communities including Dunkirk, Converse, Millgrove, Hartford City and others found themselves regular stops on the railroad throughout the late 1800s and early 1900s before automobiles and the highway system phased out rail travel. In fact, Mollie is one of several ghost towns that exist in Blackford County, and many had ties to the area’s railroad before it and their livelihoods went belly up. While the railroad and the oil boom helped build up the neighboring town of Mollie, it would be the mix of rail and cattle that would lead to the creation of and eventually the downfall of a farming community known as Renner. ​

Obituary photo of John W. Renner.

In the 1890s, the railroad spur at Renner took on a new purpose. Benjamin Johnson and his family purchased 530 acres around the railroad spur and started the Renner Stock Farm. Johnson’s farm was not a mere farm house and barn, however. Similar to a western ranch, the farm had homes for several of its employees and their families. Johnson also bred several prize-winning animals including Hampshire hogs and the champion show horse Poetry of Motion. Cattle was the bread and butter of the stock farm from its inception. Johnson developed the Bullion 4th type of Polled Hereford beef cattle, and soon, the new breed was drawing the attention of other farmers and the beef industry. To capitalize on the success of this breed, Johnson needed a way to get his product out there.

With the help of the railroad, he could ship his livestock all over the country and even internationally. Ads proclaiming the "high class" Herefords bred at the Renner Stock Farm would provide other farmers with ample return on their investment. Soon, Johnson's farm was not only breeding cattle for beef but breeding them to sell as breed stock. While the railroad had changed hands over the years, it still proved profitable for Johnson and his cattle business.

Perhaps deciding to go out on top, Johnson sold the off both his livestock and his farm in 1919 after nearly 20 years. Some of the cattle and all of the farm was purchased by Fred A. Stimson, who continued to breed the livestock and sell beef utilizing the railroad. He would sell the cattle in 1927 and focus on general farming afterwards. However, the Great Depression didn't seem to help Stimson make the farm a profitable investment.

A Hereford cow from the Renner Stock Farm that was used in an ad for cattle from the Indiana farm.

In 1937, Stimson sold the farm in its entirety to the Scripps Foundation, which was connected to Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. Today, the area is still being used for farming, but the railroad that once helped Benjamin Johnson bring international attention to his beef cattle is long gone. The descendants of Benjamin Johnson's prize-winning Herefords continue to be bred in farms across the country.

Tremont - New City West

Indiana might not be the first state that comes to mind when thinking of warm sands and national shores, but the area of Indiana that touches Lake Michigan has become an icon not only because of its landscape but because of the efforts taken to preserve it. Indiana Dunes State Park and the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore were among the first lakeshore conservation projects in America. Today, vacationers and day trippers still take the train into the park that has been running from Chicago to this area for decades. However, beneath the sands of this park are the ruins of a town that once made use of that same railroad stop. ​

The train station at Tremont today.

Founded in 1833, Tremont sort of a spin off of City west, a prosperous settlement on the shore of Lake Michigan that was originally built to serve as a major harbor for Chicago. However, the economic depression known as the Panic of 1837 made investors think twice about putting their money into City West. Abandoned, City West burned to the ground. Hoping to avoid the bad luck of their predecessor, the founders of New City West changed the name to Tremont but kept operating the City West Post Office and city west School. ​

By the 1870s, Tremont had become somewhat of a railroad hub, but its most important role for the railroad was as a town for day trippers and vacationers from big cities like Chicago who wanted to catch some sand and surf. The South Shore Line brought visitors into the Indiana Dunes around Tremont, which became the go-to town for the wealthy elite and rising middle class who rented or owned cottages, bungalows and lake houses in the area.

With the establishment of first national parks in the late 1800s and the creation of the National Park Service in 1916, conservation was becoming a popular cause among both nature-lovers and the wealthy. In addition to national parks, states like Indiana were also beginning to establish their own state park systems. The Indiana Dunes were seen by many as a great candidate for conservation, and soon a movement began to preserve them.

The hotel in Tremont.

While popular with scientists both foreign and domestic, the dunes were also popular with a growing number of tourists and as a set for early films made in the Chicago area. ​​In 1912, the conservation group known as the Prairie Club began lobbying for park status out of its headquarters at tremont. The National dunes Association was formed in 1916, and the first area of the dunes was preserved as Marquette Park in 1919. In 1925, the state of Indiana established Indiana Dunes State Park and the U.S. government began purchasing property around the lake shore in the 1950s. In 1966, the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore was established

The railroad station at Tremont in the 1920s.

While the idea of a park initially seemed like a good idea to the people of Tremont and those who vacationed there, it soon became apparent that Tremont was in the direct path conversations intended to use for preservation. This was the first blow to the community. The shift from rail travel to cars and the stock market crash 1929 only compounded the problems for the residents of Tremont.

By the 1930s, the majority of the communities buildings were gone and what was left of the community was dispersed following the establishment of the National Lakeshore in the 1960s. ​​The Dune Park Station and a few fire hydrants are all that is left of Tremont today. In fact, the headquarters for the park are now located in what was originally the town square for Tremont.

Weddleville - The Old School

A community cemetery and a former school house are all that remains near the site of Weddleville in Carr Township. Just outside of Medora, this community was on the mpa from the 1850s until the highway system changed directions and took the town’s population with it. The school that still stands here today is known as the oldest existing high school building in Indiana, though many are concerned vandalism will bring down the building.

Weddleville was laid out in 1855 by a team led by John A. Weddle, for which the community was named. When officials in Jackson County began looking for a new place to locate a school, the newly established town of Weddleville was selected. The two-story brick school building - originally called the Weddleville Schoolhouse - was constructed in 1857 and operated mainly as a high school as younger children were taught at home during this period. In addition to educating youngsters, the school building was used for community activities and gatherings. ​

As public education became mandatory, the school building began taking in younger students. The name was changed from the Weddleville School to the Carr School and eventually Carr Township High School to reflect the different locations students were coming from. The school was not the only structure in town, though. Several businesses serving the area and many residences were once located here as well. ​

The school closed in 1934 and was used by two separate churches until they outgrew the building. Around the time the school was closed, U.S. Highway 50 was moved, taking the road away from Weddleville and with it most of the traffic that supported the town’s businesses. Slowly, business owners and then residents began moving away to larger areas. In 1963, the old school building was abandoned and would remain so until it was put on the National Register of Historic Places in 1987. In the 1990s, a group of local citizens began preservation efforts to help the school and the nearby cemetery, which contains the remains of veterans from the Civil War, World War I and World War II. Oddly enough, the oldest grave in the cemetery is dated to the 1890s, some 40 years after the school was constructed.